As editor of The New Republic, Michael Kinsley once held a ‘boring headline’ competition. The standout was a snoozer from the New York Times: ‘Worthwhile Canadian Initiative.’ …Get it? Canadians are boring.
Well, America, I must admit that we’re maddeningly low on former bodybuilders, forged birth certificates or beauty queens. Our …
Lobsang Sangay, a 43-year-old Indian-born legal scholar educated at Harvard, was elected prime minister of the Tibetan government in exile after claiming 55% of votes cast by the Tibetan exile diaspora. His victory comes on the heels of the Dalai Lama’s announced departure from political life — a move that marks a new phase in the …
Fatah and Hamas, the leading Palestinian factions that parted ways amid much bloodshed four years ago, are announcing a tentative agreement to form a unity government. If it holds up, the reconciliation would mark a dramatic shift in the Israeli-Palestinian equation, in which the Palestinians move away from endless rounds of largely …
With their governments locked in conflict over how to deal with around 25,000 of Tunisians fleeing the chaos of their homeland for stability in Europe, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and his Italian opposite Silvio Berlusconi banded together Tuesday in the common cause of dumping their problem squarely in the European Union’s lap. …
It would be tempting to give French President Nicolas Sarkozy points for being consistent, except his incessant efforts to approximate the positions of surging extreme-right leader Marine Le Pen have proven so catastrophic it’s difficult not to wonder if the Elysée isn’t suffering from a deep and dysfunctional learning disability. …
Barack Obama, don’t try this at home (as if…):
French President Nicolas Sarkozy is attempting to fulfill his 2007 campaign promise to boost long-stagnant household purchasing power—easily the biggest plank in a wider election platform that has, also, mostly come to naught. So, four years on, monumentally unpopular, and up for …
By some measures the most powerful politician in Israel is Avigdor Lieberman, the foreign minister who on Wednesday was informed he faces indictment for money laundering. Benjamin Netanyahu may be prime minister, but Lieberman holds the power to collapse his coalition government and force new elections. All he has to do is withdraw the …
The aftermath of the Egyptian revolution continues to offer Israel more comfort than many expected – but also, over the weekend, a warning.
The latest good news is a poll. Despite fears that the demise of President Hosni Mubarak would also spell the end of Egypt’s peace treaty with Israel, nearly two-thirds of Egyptians in a …
France’s predominant role in international operations like the NATO-led mission over Libya–or this week’s United Nations helicopter strikes in Ivory Coast–have generated a flurry of media reports suggesting formerly Clark Kent-like French diplomats have shed their earlier mild mannered restraint, and have started wading into …
When Haiti’s presidential election got under way last summer, the big question was how large a role the nation’s large and disaffected youth vote would play. We now know the answer: Huge. Half of Haiti’s population of 9 million is under the age of 25, and Monday evening, April 4, that cohort’s candidate, flamboyant former …
For weeks, the U.N.’s mission in the Ivory Coast has sat pinned down in its quarters, watching as this West African country lurched toward civil war. An escalating conflict between the rival forces of Laurent Gbagbo and Alassane Ouattara has led to hundreds, probably thousands of deaths and has displaced, by some counts, over a million …
The U.S. Republican party isn’t the only big conservative force in Western politics experiencing divisions between its traditionally moderate majority and a defiantly rightward-leaning wing. France’s ruling Union for a Popular Majority (UMP) is similarly witnessing public clashes between internal factions generated by efforts to …
French pundits who had feared an historically high score by the extreme-right National Front (FN) in Sunday’s second round of local polling breathed a sigh of relief when the party’s tally didn’t meet expectations. But while the FN’s 11% performance was well below its 15% first-round take—and nearly half of the 20% result some …
